Cuban blogger pays price for her opinions

Cuban native Yoani Sanchez isn't known for holding her tongue, even in a country without freedom of expression. Her outspokenness has earned her the label of "mercenary of imperialism" and around-the-clock surveillance.

There are some lessons we learn without needing a teacher. They're the lessons that get passed on through whispers at home.

It's thanks to these kinds of lessons that I realized, even as a young person in the 80s, that we Cubans would only be allowed to have a voice as a state-organized group. We had to be members of an official organization or face punishment. Forming our our own groups or clubs was out of the question. It's a lesson we learned and learned well.

As children we were automatically part of the Young Pioneers and when girls turned 14 they became members of the Women's Club. The neighbors went to the meeting for the Committee to Protect the Revolution and workers were part of the national union. There was an organization for students and another for farmers.

All of our names showed up on the memberships lists for any number of state organizations. But none of them allowed us to determine how things were run, or organized. Instead, they were designed to instill order – from the top down.

A desire to integrate

As a girl, I was impressed by the annual celebrations marking the Cuban revolution. All of the big organizations were called to the Plaza de la Revolución where at some point, the crowd would begin singing song with names like "Cuba, yes! Yankees, no!" and "Fidel knows how to send the Yankees to hell."

Every time you applied for a job, for a spot at a university or for the right to buy a house, you had to fill out a long form. But all the questions really boiled down to one: Which state organizations do you belong to?

The most important ones – the Communist Party and the Union of Young Communists – were at the top of the list. Now when I think back to how I automatically checked the boxes with abbreviations like OPJM, CDR and FMC, it all seems so silly. I was like a machine, a so-called "integrated citizen" – a "normal revolutionary."

The truth comes to light

I can't remember the exact moment when I suddenly felt the desire to speak my mind and let my opinions be heard, the moment when I wanted to say things that differed from the ubiquitous slogans, when I wanted to belong to groups that truly had shared interests.

But what I do remember is that my problems started as soon as I started speaking my mind. I was at university and published a magazine titled "Letter for Letter."

It was an alternative publication made up of poetry, personal essays and prose. At some point I was summoned to the university dean's office. He told me I couldn't hand out "that stuff" to students anymore.

Even after this run-in, I still believed the state's stories: "Political prisoners are in jail in Cuba because they are agents of imperialism."

The truth finally came out during the "Black Spring" in 2003. Within two weeks, 75 people who were critical of the regime were taken into custody and sentenced to between 15 and 28 years in prison – all for speaking their mind and organizing meetings not sponsored by the state.

I knew some of those people and what they had at their disposal: typewriters, tape recorders, words.

The state strikes back

It wasn't long after that I myself was labeled a "mercenary of imperialism" for having the audacity to put my blog, "Generation Y," online. I used the blog to write about everyday things I noticed in the world around me.

The simple fact that I published my opinions and pointed out that all these organizations did more to control rather than represent us carried serious consequences. Even now, I can't leave the country. The state is seeking revenge because I contradicted it. People follow me on the street, watching my every move. My telephone has been tapped.

Opinions are not crimes

I stopped parroting the government's slogans years ago and I no longer belong to any official organizations. I am a free citizen, a free radical. My blog, my political platform, consists of a single demand: the diversity of opinion can no longer be a crime!

But we in Cuba are still far from reaching this goal. Regardless of the slight opening up that has taken place, criticism remains unwelcome – whether it's questioning a minister's management or a school's curriculum.

In Cuba, since the government makes it impossible to start something as banal as a fan club for salamanders, there's no chance anyone is going to found a new political party anytime soon.

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